Headed to Dunbogan over the weekend for my another sail. I was planning on going to Port Macquarie but the town was pretty much shut from external entry due to the half Ironman that was on for the weekend.

Arrived at the waters edge unpack all my gear and fitted the Hobie Adventure Island Tramps, these were very straight forward to fit and really make the AI stand out as well. Looks like something out of star wars.

Anyway hit the water and went for a bit of a sail, sailed up the river toward Watson Taylors Lake on a pretty light wind for most of the morning. Stopped off for a bit of lunch and put the camera away.

Starting making my way back and wind really whipped up now, giving me half a meter waves to contend with, then the rudder didn’t seem to want to play the game, kept on pulling left, I was starting to think how was I going to make it back and got a little worried with the wind blowing strong. I managed to get it working somehow and needed to hold the rudder handle all the way back to head in the direction required, something I could have done without in my first bit of decent wind while getting used to the sailing.

In the end was some good experience and I will be going out again this weekend for some more.

Did you have the rudder down-line cleated down? Failure to do that is the usual cause of rudder problems with the AI. Failing that, you may have just been experiencing weather helm - the solution to that is to ease the mainsheet a bit and if that doesn't work, furl the sail a couple of turns.